Cover Oregon falls short

PORTLAND (AP) — Oregon’s problem-plagued health insurance exchange has enrolled about 20,000 people in private coverage, far below original projections, according to new numbers released by Cover Oregon on Tuesday. The new numbers come the day after the state’s deadline to enroll for January coverage. In December, the state scaled down its low level projections of 31,500 Oregonians enrolled in private health care by January 2014 to 20,700 people. Fewer people have been enrolling in other states as well.

In Oregon, the low enrollment numbers are largely due to the online enrollment system failing to go live. Technical issues with the Oracle Corp.-built exchange forced Oregonians to rely exclusively on paper applications.